michael pollak

all the answers

To Everywhere in 42 Minutes

In 1965, mathematician Paul Cooper theorized that the fastest, most efficient way to travel across continents would be to bore a straight hollow tube directly through the earth, evacuate it (remove the air), and then just fall through. The first half of the journey consists of free-fall acceleration, while the second half consists of an exactly equal deceleration. The time for such a journey works out to be 42 minutes. Remarkably, even if the tube does not pass through the exact center of the earth, the time for a journey powered entirely by gravity always works out to be 42 minutes, as long as the tube remains friction-free.

Ein toller Wikipedia-Eintrag: Answer_to_Life,_the_Universe,_and_Everything